Chapter 5
“That’s all for today’s livestream. I’m going to take her to the police station. I’ll announce the time of my next livestream in advance.” Xie Chi quickly ended the broadcast, afraid that if she continued, something might happen that she wouldn’t be able to explain away.
After ending the livestream, Xie Chi no longer restrained the little darling she was raising inside the box. She even specially let her out to get some fresh air.
Dark-colored yin energy crawled out of her sleeve. Apparently knowing that Xie Chi was her financial backer… No, her owner, it rubbed affectionately against her wrist before crawling toward the female ghost.
When Xie Chi first found her, her soul had already suffered severe injuries. Not only was she currently unable to condense into a physical spirit form, but her consciousness had also deteriorated to the point where only her instincts remained. Her damaged soul left her constantly obsessed with replenishing herself. Whenever she saw another ghost, she practically started drooling.
The black mist approached the female ghost, then swiftly transformed into an enormous, bloody maw, preparing to bite down on her head. Fortunately, Xie Chi reacted quickly. She grabbed the little creature and began stroking her vigorously. “You can’t eat this! Quick, quick, spit it out!”
The little ball of black mist had already clamped her jaws around the female ghost’s head and was extremely reluctant to let go. However, she knew that Xie Chi was the one who fed her blood every day, and that blood tasted much better than these wandering souls and wild ghosts. After thinking it over seriously, she reluctantly spat the female ghost’s head back out.
“Such a good girl.” Xie Chi cupped the little ball of black mist in her hands and gave her another thorough round of affectionate strokes. She felt that there couldn’t possibly be a more obedient little darling in the entire world than her Xiao Hei. Her heart instantly melted.
Only the thoroughly dumbfounded female ghost remained. Trembling, she shrank into a corner, desperate to avoid becoming a snack and having her soul completely scattered, thereby losing even the chance to reincarnate.
I’m such an idiot.
I knew Xie Chi wasn’t someone ordinary, but I never imagined there were people these days who wouldn’t even spare ghosts, treating them like crunchy corn snacks and preparing to gobble them up.
How ruthless…
Xie Chi paid the female ghost no further attention. She was merely a minor character and wasn’t important. The priority now was to check on the young man. If he ended up dying in this hospital, it would be her fault.
Xie Chi continued forward. The mist gradually thickened as yin energy spread throughout the entire area. This place had already become the ghosts’ territory. From time to time, hands emerged from the walls, ceiling, and floor, but before they could even touch Xie Chi, they were frightened away by the black mist coiled around her body and fled in every direction.
Although the black mist surrounding Xie Chi belonged to a damaged soul, that soul possessed an overwhelming amount of malevolent energy. It was filled with an exceptionally fierce and sinister aura. Worse still, it looked at the other ghosts as though they were delicious meals. Who would dare approach it…?
Thus, Xie Chi proceeded without encountering the slightest obstruction. Pushing through the fog formed by yin energy, she finally reached its densest source. When she pushed open the door, everything inside came into view.
The young man was sitting beside a hospital bed at the far end of the room, holding a white swaddled bundle in his arms. His head was lowered, making his expression difficult to discern. He merely rocked his arms gently, his movements as tender as those of a mother soothing her child to sleep.
The black mist coiled around Xie Chi’s body, or more precisely, clinging to her neck, instantly grew excited. She was practically unable to contain her impatience, circling around Xie Chi repeatedly. Mm, she looked exactly like a cat waiting for its owner to pour food into its bowl.
“Get the hell out of that body!” Carrying the peachwood sword, Xie Chi walked forward expressionlessly. “I haven’t killed anything in a long time. Don’t make me break that streak.”
The young man raised his head, his eyes filled with tenderness. Surprisingly, when he spoke, his voice sounded like a woman’s. “I am merely an ordinary mother who longs for her child to be born. Why must you make things difficult for me?”
“Your child?” Xie Chi stopped in front of him. “It’s nothing more than a fragmentary soul formed from the lingering obsessions of countless infants who died prematurely. Just because you claim it’s yours, does that make it your child? If you call out to it, will it call you Mom?”
Young Man: ??
Why the fuck aren’t you following the usual script?!
The young man—or rather, the female ghost possessing his body—instantly lost the gentleness in her expression.
The white swaddling cloth in her arms rapidly turned crimson with blood. A baby’s loud, piercing cries rang out, so shrill and grating that they sounded like countless people simultaneously playing Douyin videos through their phones’ stereo speakers.
At maximum volume, no less.
“You’ve been a ghost for at least several hundred years, yet all you think about every day is becoming a mother to someone else’s child. No wonder you still haven’t reincarnated.” Xie Chi weighed the peachwood sword in her hand and decided it wasn’t particularly useful. She casually tossed it onto the hospital bed beside her, rolled up her sleeve, and punched the young man squarely in the face.
Bang!
A shadowy figure flickered and was nearly knocked out of his body. It staggered before hurriedly plunging back into the young man.
The ghost fetus in his arms was enraged. The bloody, mangled lump of flesh had no eyes, only a mouth filled with sharp teeth. It sprang out of the swaddling cloth and lunged straight at Xie Chi.
Xie Chi was in the middle of rolling up her other sleeve. Seeing it charge at her, she threw a punch, striking the lump of flesh directly in its mouth.
With a thud, she smashed it into the floor.
The fleshy lump bounced twice like a rubber ball, completely stunned by the blow.
This ghostly mother and child had been ghosts for several hundred years. They had encountered all kinds of Taoist arts and techniques, as well as formations and magical artifacts. Yet this was their first time witnessing an exorcism performed through sheer physical force.
A fist that was literally as big as a clay pot.
The lump of flesh rolled several times across the floor. Suddenly, dozens of eyes opened all over its surface, each one bright red as though soaked in blood.
In an instant, the fleshy lump melted like a popsicle beneath the blazing sun, dissolving into a puddle of blood. Countless fragmented souls emerged from the bloody liquid and rushed toward the young man, scrambling over one another.
Knowing they couldn’t win through fighting, they had chosen another approach.
That lump of flesh was a ghost fetus. Xie Chi didn’t know where these fragmented souls had come from, but even a ghost fetus couldn’t enable the strange creature formed from them to reincarnate. It could only give them that grotesque, neither-human-nor-ghost form from before. Therefore, abandoning it wasn’t much of a loss.
The female ghost possessing the young man instantly opened her mouth. The fragmented souls and the bloody liquid formed from the fleshy lump all poured inside.
Xie Chi couldn’t stop her in time and was left dumbfounded.
“Oh no!”
Xie Chi hurried forward and punched the young man in the stomach.
The female ghost was remarkably stubborn. She clamped a hand over her mouth and forcibly swallowed all those miscellaneous things.
“Get out here! And bring those little bastards of yours out too! Hurry up!” Xie Chi viciously punched her again.
The blow made the female ghost retch, vomiting a whole mess of instant noodles onto the floor…
“Too late…” The female ghost possessing the young man wore an especially eerie smile. “I know you’re no ordinary person, but even someone like you can’t possibly…”
Before the female ghost could finish speaking, Xie Chi grabbed her and delivered a rapid barrage of blows, forcibly beating her right out of the young man’s body.
At Xie Chi’s command, the female ghost was immediately surrounded by the little darling she was raising.
Female Ghost: Weak, pitiful, helpless… trembling in fear…
Xie Chi punched the young man’s stomach several more times, making him vomit up everything he’d eaten for his late-night snack. Yet not even the slightest trace of a ghost emerged.
Xie Chi turned toward the female ghost.
“I don’t have a very good temper. So tell me, are you going to get that ghost fetus out, or should I kill you first?”
“D-didn’t you say you hadn’t killed anything in a long time…?” The female ghost had lost every trace of her earlier arrogance.
The main reason was that the little ball of black mist was circling her with an expression of ravenous anticipation, looking as though she was searching for the perfect place to take her first bite.
Although the female ghost was several hundred years old, she wasn’t particularly powerful.
During her lifetime, she had been pregnant with three children. Two had ended in miscarriages, while the third had died shortly after birth. The resentment born from those tragedies had been so intense that it transformed her into a resentful ghost. Clinging to her obsession, she had never reincarnated.
“That’s right. I haven’t killed anything in two weeks.” Xie Chi’s voice was cold. “But you’re a ghost. Killing you doesn’t count as taking a life. Besides, I don’t even need to do it myself. Xiao Hei.”
The little ball of black mist excitedly opened her enormous mouth, ready to begin her meal the moment Xie Chi gave the order.
Female Ghost: …
With a pitiful whimper, she collapsed onto the floor, trembling uncontrollably.
“Th-there really isn’t any way… M-maybe there is, but I don’t know how… My resentment is mixed with all sorts of impurities. I-I don’t taste good…”
She probably wasn’t lying.
Xie Chi frowned deeply. After a long moment, she took out a small bottle, stuffed the female ghost inside, and tossed it to the little ball of black mist to play with.
“You’re not allowed to eat her. We’ll take her back and ask my martial nephew about this.”
The little ball of black mist was stunned.
She wasn’t allowed to eat it, but she still had to carry it around?!
Wasn’t that a little too cruel?!
She held the bottle in her mouth, staring blankly for quite some time before pitifully crawling back onto Xie Chi’s body.
All her earlier enthusiasm had vanished. She resembled a soft puddle of mud, clinging limply to Xie Chi.
Feeling somewhat troubled, Xie Chi went to check on the young man.
He was still unconscious, which gave her some time to organize her thoughts and figure out how to break the terrible news to him.
The young man woke up half an hour later.
He had no memory of what happened while he was possessed. Upon regaining consciousness, all he felt was an aching pain throughout his body, exactly like those descriptions in old-fashioned CEO romance novels: like a doll that had been thoroughly played with and left battered and broken…
Or, to put it another way, like someone who’d been run over by a car.
His face was particularly bad. It was completely swollen.
“Hiss…” The young man covered his stomach and sucked in a sharp breath. “D-did someone beat me up while I was unconscious? Whoever it was really didn’t hold back!”
Xie Chi: …
She raised her head and stared at the ceiling.
Then she decided that avoiding responsibility wasn’t right. So she looked at the young man with an innocent and sincere expression.
“When I arrived, you were possessed by a female ghost. Maybe she took the opportunity to do something to your body. Would you like me to take you to the hospital?”
“Not necessary for now. Wait a minute! You finally believe that ghosts exist in this world?!”
The young man became inexplicably excited.
“See! I told you I wasn’t a scammer… Holy shit, that hurts!”
He clutched the corner of his mouth.
He had gotten so excited that he’d smiled too widely, pulling at the bruised, swollen corner of his lips. A sharp pain immediately shot through it.
“Mm-hmm, mm-hmm…”
Xie Chi felt just the tiniest bit guilty.
But it wasn’t entirely her fault. After all, she hadn’t had her usual weapon with her, so she’d had no choice but to rely on her fists to physically exorcise the ghost.
“I still think I should take you to the hospital and have you checked out.”
“They’re just minor injuries.” The young man waved his hand dismissively. “But why did that female ghost leave so easily? Something doesn’t seem right… I underestimated her. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have ended up like this. Hiss…”
He grimaced in pain but still tried his best to soften his voice and reassure Xie Chi.
“Don’t worry. I’ll ask my masters and elders for help to resolve this matter. My skills simply aren’t good enough. If that female ghost hadn’t left on her own, I’m afraid I might have dragged you into danger too.”
Xie Chi felt another pang of guilt.
She remained silent for a moment before saying, “Why don’t you… try feeling your stomach again?”
“Hm?”
The young man rubbed his belly.
Apart from being a little sore, there didn’t seem to be anything…
Wait a minute!
He lowered his head in horror and stared at his stomach.
“HOLY SHIT! WHY THE HELL IS MY STOMACH SO BIG?!”
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